“An employer can’t fire someone right before they’re going to make the disclosure or report the violation because that clearly frustrates the purpose of our whistleblower laws, which is to report wrongdoing.”

~Mariko Yoshihara

The new California law covers both private and public employees.

Employees will also be shielded legally if they report wrongdoing to someone within their organization, not just to government authorities. Yoshihara said that's not the case right now.

“For example, if there was a safety violation, a worker would be covered if they reported the violation to OSHA, but if they reported that same violation to say, a manager, they wouldn’t necessarily be protected by retaliation from the employer," said Yoshihara.

A law that extends California’s paid family leave benefit to people caring for grandchildren, grandparents, siblings and in-laws will go into effect July 1. The original law took effect on the same day 10 years ago.

California voters will decide this fall whether some low-level drug and theft offenses should be tried as misdemeanors instead of felonies. Meanwhile, the Legislature and Board of Equalization are pushing policies to help the food industry.